


What the Sky Looks Like from Your View

by Dolorosa



Category: Winternight Series - Katherine Arden
Genre: F/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 04:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17015538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dolorosa/pseuds/Dolorosa
Summary: Vasya and Morozko transform each other.





	What the Sky Looks Like from Your View

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gingerschnapps](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gingerschnapps/gifts).



Vasya stayed as long as she could bear. While she told herself she was remaining for the sake of Solovey — so that he could rest, feed, and regain his strength — in reality it was because she sensed her family needed her. Masha was confused and disoriented by her ordeal in the tower, and clung to Vasya, wanting constant reassurance. Olga's was a less obvious need, and she left her words unspoken, her hands tense and white and in constant motion, anxiously gripping the cloth she was ostensibly embroidering. Vasya stayed by her side, and said nothing. When she could, she made her way out to the stables, drawing comfort from Solovey's solid presence, brushing him down, combing his mane, and slipping him hot porridge from the kitchens.

No one in the household tried to stop her, and there was a relief in that, as if a great weight had been lifted. Freed from the burden of hiding her identity, and the expectation of behaving as young women were supposed to behave, Vasya waited. And Moscow waited with her.

The city itself was in ruins — buildings smouldering, people's possessions looted, horses and livestock scattered. Its inhabitants moved about with the knowledge that this was just the beginning, the first wave of fire and destruction. They braced themselves for war. Vasya gleaned what she could of the official preparations from Sasha's occasional visits, but her brother was kept busy and he was too distracted with food caches, arming civilians with hastily forged weapons, and trying to predict the timing and direction of the next attack to be truly informative. Whereas before she might have gone about unnoticed and gathered information that way, Vasya was now too visible. And so she, like the city, paused for breath, gathered her strength, and waited.

But eventually she had to face the truth: she was not made for waiting. The walls of the _terem_ — the walls of Moscow — were not wide enough for her. The snow — Morozko's temporary reprieve — had turned to sludge. The _chyerti_ were restless and impatient with her. There were not enough wild things, nor growing things, within the boundaries of the city. Solovey was strong enough. _She_ was strong enough. She had lingered too long. And so, after a careful farewell to her sister, niece, and brother, and a hasty evening spent gathering supplies from Olga's kitchens and stables, Vasya rode away.

It was icy dawn when Vasya left the city, perched on Solovey's back, her eyes clear and alert. Horse and rider picked their way through the detritus in the streets, their breath visible in the cool air. And once they were under the great gate, Vasya urged Solovey forward, and they fled. She rode in fear and fury, past walled towns and scattered collections of farmhouses, scarcely noticing when the road beneath her changed first to a rough country track, and then nothing. She had lost track of the days that had passed, the direction in which Solovey was travelling, the features of the land through which she travelled. Her store of food dwindled, her hands under their mittens were blue with cold, and her eyes smarted and stung from the wind. Still she continued, forwards, onwards, her senses numb, her awareness foggy.

It was the sharp change in landscape that brought her back to herself. All at once she realised she could not recall how much time had passed since she'd last seen evidence of human habitation. She brought Solovey to an abrupt halt, and looked around.

Everything was ice and snow. She could not quite ascertain whether this was a natural snowfall, or whether Morozko's work had stretched this far. All she could see was an expanse of white. Nothing grew on this wild, desolate landscape — she supposed all the grass was hidden beneath the ice, waiting for the thaw. The wind howled across the tundra, and Vasya suddenly realised how small she was, and how vulnerable. She was surprised Solovey had consented to carry her so far.

All at once she was overwhelmed with how far she had come. She didn't think she would be able to retrace her steps, even if she wanted to. The ice seeped into her bones, and the whirling snow blinded her. She was struck by the complete absence of life that surrounded her. She drew Solovey to her, suddenly feeling the need for his reassuring presence.

'I don't think it's safe to continue in this howling snowstorm,' she said. 'We'll have to wait it out. I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking.'

Solovey huffed, and stamped his hooves, but said nothing otherwise. Vasya tried to bank up the snow around them as a makeshift windbreak, but the storm was too fierce, and her hands too cold. After a few minutes she gave up, and huddled next to Solovey, chewing on the last of the dried meat she'd brought with her from Moscow, and melting snow in her mouth. She shivered.

*

The passage of time seemed both accelerated and endless, in that snowstorm in the tundra. The icy wind lashed her cheeks, stealing under her fur-lined hood and knotting her hair into a thousand tangles. She couldn't see to move towards Solovey's saddlebags and check their supplies — she knew there was very little food left, but she was in a realm beyond fear, her mind too foggy to worry about it. There was no sun, no night, just the endless whirl of grey and white, drenching clothes and shoes and Solovey's magnificent mane and tail. Her lips were chapped and numb, shocked into feeling only when she raised another fistful of snow to her mouth, more to pass the time than to quench her thirst.

At some point, Vasya realised she had slumped to the ground, sitting in a guarded crouch, her back pressed against one of Solovey's legs. The storm continued to howl and shriek, like the unquiet dead, but her own mind was curiously peaceful. Her thoughts drifted behind her closed eyes, until she was no longer certain of her own reality. Flashes of her past came to her in glimpses: burning farmhouses, the wrinkled _bannik_ , wreathed in steam, Olga, carried away down the road to Moscow, and marriage, the _rusalka_ in the lake, her arms entreating. She felt herself leave her body, swooping through the air, above the chaos and torment of the snowstorm, travelling beside birds of prey, their eyes sharp, their wings strong. Cold was replaced by tingling, surging power. Her blood sang. She felt unbound.

She was brought back to herself by a sharp nip from Solovey, tumbling back into awareness so swiftly that it was almost painful. And as she returned to her own body, she realised the pair of them were no longer alone.

'You came,' she whispered, hauling herself to her feet, swaying slightly against the force of the wind. 'You found me.'

Morozko held himself a little bit apart, as if Vasya were a wounded animal that would shy away if touched. His voice, when he spoke, was like the creak of ancient trees, their branches heavy with the first snowfall.

'I came because the storm and the tundra spoke to me: they told me of your footsteps, of your presence in the air. The ice beneath the earth rang out with tales of your journey. The wind cried your name.'

Slowly, hesitantly, carefully, he took a step in her direction.

'That's all very poetic,' Vasya said through chattering teeth. 'Please tell them all I'm grateful.'

She pressed her hand into Solovey's side to steady herself, and then brushed the snow from her hood, raising her face to look Morozko in the eye.

'I also came because of you,' he said, more quietly. 'I could feel your need.'

'I thought I'd severed that connection forever,' said Vasya in wonder.

'I cannot explain it either,' said Morozko, his eyes glittering like ice. 'It is as if the direct link between us had been replaced by a thousand twisting tendrils, tying you to the land and earth and sky, and those then reached out to me on your behalf. I said before that my ... association with you had rendered me other than myself. Feelings complicating the indifference of death. Now I begin to wonder if you are changed also — altered fundamentally. While you are still bound by, and contained within, your frail human body, it is as if you matter more. The land feels your presence, where before you travelled across it unnoticed.'

Vasya closed the remaining distance between herself and Morozko. She did not try to touch him, just stood by his side. It was he who took that final step, laying his bare hand heavily upon her shoulder, like the weight of banked snow tumbling down a chimney. He reached into the air with his other arm, making a complicated series of gestures just outside the line of Vasya's sight. The storm sighed, and calmed. He pulled ice from the air and handed it to her to drink. She cupped it in her gloved hands, briefly, before laying it on her tongue, clear and sharp and chilling.

'Drink slowly,' said Morozko. 'Your body is at the very outer limit of its strength.'

She drank the icy water, revelling in the feeling of sensation returning to her body. Morozko beside her was a reassuring presence, as brittle and unbending as the icy expanse of the tundra that surrounded her. Vasya didn't stop to wonder what it said about her that a being like Morozko was a source of comfort and support. They stood there together in stillness, during that pause, allowing Vasya those slow moments of recovery, knowing that they both waited on the threshold of a choice from which there was no return.

He didn't seem to move, and she didn't seem to move, but all at once she had melted into him, reaching up to cup his face and kiss him. Her lips were cracked, and stung at the touch, but she welcomed it, that sharp rush of feeling that reminded her she was alive. His hands slipped under the hood of her cloak, trailing downward. Their icy touch left paths of burning across her neck and collarbone.

She pulled away from him, gasping, feeling a strange new power infusing her body, calling her name. The air seemed to hum and crackle with promise. Without quite knowing what she was doing, Vasya crouched down on the frozen earth, removing her gloves and placing her bare hands on the ice. She felt seeds and roots and the faint call of the heart of the forest, and, reaching deep within herself, pulled those growing things outward and upward. Almost no time seemed to pass at all before the ice was melting around her, in a wide swathe radiating in all directions. And then they saw it: first a few shoots, poking their way hesitantly out of the freezing ground. As the shoots continued to emerge they began to grow more swiftly, forming themselves into a cherry tree, which bloomed unseasonably and scattered white blossoms through the air. 

Vasya reached up to touch the branches, as if to reassure herself they were real, and at her touch the blossoms ripened into fruit. Reddish-gold apples appeared in her hands, and she fed them to Solovey, who ate them with a satisfying crunch. Once he had eaten his fill, Vasya returned to the cherry tree, and plucked armfuls of the ripe red fruit, stuffing them into her mouth, gorging herself until she felt overwhelmed by their sweet-tart flavour. Her lips were stained with a faint dark red, and the berry juices ran down her fingers. Scarcely knowing what it was she was doing, she picked one last fruit from that miraculous tree and, hesitantly, pressed it into Morozko's mouth. He accepted it in shock, a red rush of life swallowed up by the embodiment of death. They clung to each other again. As Vasya embraced Morozko, vines bloomed under her fingers, their tendrils coiling down, twisting around their joined hands. He kissed her closed eyes, trailing frost across her eyelashes. His skin was warm in the places she had touched him, hers icy cold in the places he had kissed.

They stood entwined together, transformed, transforming each other, their minds a sea of questions. Vasya had carved out a little hollow of life — spring slipping into summer — from within the very heart of winter. Cherry blossom petals drifted past them, where before there had been snowflakes. The wind had stilled, and the sky was clear. Around them on all sides was the tundra, surrounding them with its icy, unquiet plains.

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this work is taken from the lyrics to the song ['The Fox' by Niki & the Dove](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2f6UbMnlq4).
> 
> Due to the timing of Yuletide, this work was obviously written before the publication of _The Winter of the Witch_ , so it may not be compliant with the direction of canon in the third book.


End file.
